


Yearning for the Pearl

by 112ance



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: (for these idiots), Bisexual Lance (Voltron), Comfort, Filipino Lance (Voltron), Gay Keith (Voltron), I mean, JuLance Challenge 2020, Julance Prompt: Lance & Keith, Lance (Voltron) is Homesick, Life is Strange 2-ish, M/M, Mutual Pining, i like to HC Lance as pinoy, it has nice moments, why not
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-19
Updated: 2020-07-19
Packaged: 2021-03-05 00:49:07
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 10,170
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25375702
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/112ance/pseuds/112ance
Summary: It takes being far, far away from something for one to realize they've taken it for granted. It took Lance the forest and camping out on tents for the thoughts of his family to dawn on him.He misses them. He misses home.But Cecelia Ahern says, "Home isn't a place; it's a feeling."Written for the JuLance 2020 prompt: Lance & Keith.
Relationships: Keith & Lance (Voltron), Keith/Lance (Voltron)
Comments: 5
Kudos: 23





	Yearning for the Pearl

**Author's Note:**

> I am late for this prompt but screw it. Julance is not over yet.
> 
> I recommend listening to this track while reading: Spitzer - Final Voyage ([Youtube](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xKoA7VFR7Mo) or [Spotify](https://open.spotify.com/track/0Xli6bzJnaspz1mgtQXxh4?si=tfqP0sDIT6O9HzgSHK8UzQ)), mostly because this is what gave me the inspiration to finish this. Also, it give that vibe of sitting under the stars, and it...sounds like a Minecraft soundtrack. Sleeping at Last songs are just so _lovely_.

Lance strikes himself to have trouble sleeping.  


Again.  


It’s been going on for a few days. Some days, its presence and his awareness of it are both absent. In some cases, only awareness of it lurks around in his headspace, making it easier to ignore and to just brush off as mundane, just like any other task he needed done during that time. Although, in some moments, the thought clings to him like a tarsier on a tree branch, settling its place as default in his head, and once outside forces come to wake it up, it’ll unpleasantly thrive in stress and eventually die from it.  


Tonight, they’re growing louder than he’s ever heard them.  


So, he grabs his jacket with the white hood, and steps outside his tent.  


The night is chilly. The night has matured. The night possesses that comforting atmosphere that needs little to no words to flood someone with a certain kind of calm.  


They said sleeping gives your mind peace.  


But how about when someone can’t because of the chaos residing in their mind bank? Wherein “peace” is nowhere to be found?  


Lance hopes to find it in the area cleared of trees to supply visibility to the running water down the stream. It’s a long shot, considering how the thoughts have bathed him—some could even say _drowned_ him—but he makes it a point to just at least _try_.  


He sits on a log that seemed to have been sleeping on the ground to the sound of the waters filling the air. The displeasing familiarity of yearning urges him to discontinue being private about his feelings for longer.  


“I miss them,” he speaks, voice coming out choked in the tears he holds back. He clings onto his olive-green jacket, clutching onto the fabric to reminisce about the comfort of being at his own home. He knows that he would be able to see his family soon, but since his eyes shoot open every time the “What if” questions completely derail his train of thought, counting sheep renders the practice useless. It had made him tired, but all too aware of the thoughts that end up making him wallow about every possible outcome before he’d be welcomed back home.  


He takes a moment to catch his breath, taking his time to unconsciously let the rapid rise and fall of his chest come to a steady rhythm of a more manageable pace. “I miss my parents,” he declares, eyes tired and interested at his feet and the ground that resembles dry soil mixed with sand. He digs his slippers into the ground, rubbing it back and forth, side-to-side, forming an unintelligible figure on the soil that stands as a metaphor for the tsunami destroying his peace of mind, shoreline completely drenched and devastated by his overwhelming ocean of thoughts.  


“I miss Veronica and her sisterly self, always there to tease me whenever she had a chance, but always there for me when I need someone to talk to or when I need advice,” he says to the wind, hands tightening their grip on the rough log of wood he’s sitting on. “I miss Leo, and his adorable smile whenever he tells me about his favorite new character on the book he was reading,” he smiles, only for it to be short-lived as he continues on to Maria and her awkwardness.  


He sighs audibly and frowns at the incoming thought escaping through his lips. “I miss _lolo’t lola_ , and their incredible _pancit_ ,” he bites his lower lip, the memory of how the dish tastes on his tongue slowly fading from being gone for too long. He then names a few other dishes he remembers that are his favorites, like _sisig, adobo, afritada, sinigang_ and moving onto his favorite kinds of bread: garlic knots and cheesebread.  


He shifts his gaze up towards the blanket of darkness above his head with sparks of stars splattered about, the night sky making way for the moon to have its very own obscure limelight, leaving only a bit of visibility to the trees that rooted beyond the steady stream of the river. Trees blanket some of his view of midnight falling under his peripheral vision, the sight looking like an accident consisting of an ink bottle spilling on a sheet of paper. The brilliance of the moon shines nonetheless on the surface of the water, the sheer magnificence unfailing to take his breath away.  


Cold. The night is cold. His own arms wrap around him in a poor attempt to warm up. He ducks his head and exhales through his mouth, exasperated.  


_I want to go home._  


“Lance.”  


Head shooting up at the sound of his name, he grips himself tighter to try to contain his surprise. He whips his head around, forcing a smile at the familiar face he witnesses but ending up tucking the half of his lower lip underneath his teeth. “Oh. Uh. Hey, Keith.”  


“Are you okay?” Keith asks, sitting himself beside Lance all while keeping a reasonable distance between them.  


Lance brushes the back of his hand on his nose, sniffling briefly. He takes an interest in the silhouettes of the trees in the forest ahead of them to avoid meeting Keith’s gaze. “Yeah,” he says weakly, sounding more like a whisper if anything. “I’m alright. When am I ever not?”  


“Right now.”  


Lance fidgets by rubbing his palms together, his anxiety contributing to the cold air pricking his hands. “Don’t worry about it. It’s… alright.”  


Silence lasts between them for a solid ten seconds, before Keith breaks it with a question. “You miss home, don’t you?”  


It feels like Lance has been caught red-handed, but instead of being apprehended of doing a misdeed, it seems as though Keith peered beyond the walls he put up around himself and discovered the truth. He chuckles, sadness and a sense of fragmentation of something significant dripping in each sound. “How’d you know?”  


Keith shrugs. “You’re not exactly subtle about it.”  


“How so?”  


“This isn’t the first time you couldn’t bring yourself to sleep, Lance.”  


A smirk finds its way into Lance’s face to project itself playfully, ironic to the homesickness honestly swallowing him up at the mention of it in Keith’s statement. “You spying on me, Kogane?”  


“I’m worried about you,” he says, causing Lance to drop the act and stare at the darkness ahead of him. “All of us are.”  


Lance chews on his bottom lip, only managing to croak out a, “Sorry.”  


“No, it’s alright. There’s nothing to be sorry about,” Keith reassures, following Lance’s gaze to the forest. A small sigh leaves his lips. He rests his hands on the rough log of wood supporting the weight of his upper body as he slightly tilts his head up to settle his gaze towards the night sky.  


Honesty in the form of a whisper makes Lance admit his longing for the distant familiarity. “Yeah. I miss them. Maybe too much.”  


Keith hums, nodding briefly. “I know.”  


“Don’t you miss it?”  


Keith shakes his head. “I’m not easily attached to places, so…”  


“Yeah,” Lance chuckles curtly, “Figures.” _Shit_. He grimaces. “I—no—I’m sorry, I didn’t mean—"  


“Hey. Don’t worry about it, okay?” Keith waves a hand dismissively, smiling as faint as the little amount of light around them. “I’m not offended, or anything.”  


Another moment of silence kept them still for only half the time before it is Lance’s turn to fill it in. “What about you?”  


“Huh?” Keith furrows his brow, meeting with Lance’s eyes, which are now focused on him instead of the shadow of the night. They look almost glassy, glowing forlornly in the reflection of the moonlight, hope subtle behind the melancholy.  


“What are you doing out here?”  


Keith’s shoulders raise to meet with his ears. “Couldn’t sleep.”  


“Fair enough.”  


“Aren’t you cold?”  


“…No. No, not really.”  


An eyebrow on Keith’s face lifts up, unconvinced with Lance’s refusal. “Then why do you have your arms around yourself?”  


Lance kneads his lips together. A sigh falls flatly from his nose. “…Maybe I’m a little bit cold.”  


“Thought so,” Keith figures, proceeding to take his red jacket off.  


“Hey, no. You don’t have to—”  


“Too late. Take it. I can’t have you freezing to death out here.”  


“No, man, I’m serious, I’m fine—”  


Keith sighs soundly. “If you’re gonna be so stubborn,” he turns to Lance, inching closer to drape his jacket over Lance’s shoulders, “then I might as well take matters into my own hands.”  


Lance can’t even do much other than protest as warmth floods over his back. “Hey, c’mon—What about you?”  


“I’m fine,” Keith huffs. “I’m used to the cold, anyway.”  


Lance sighs, admitting defeat and only settles on gripping the fabric of Keith’s jacket atop his own that has its zippers sewed onto to seal in the warmth that makes the cold a bit more bearable. He sighs through his nose once again, lips pressing into a thin line. “Thanks, man.”  


Keith lets himself smile. “No problem.”  


A faint smile creeps up into Lance’s lips, illuminated by the moonlight with similar intensity.  


They seat themselves in tranquility. Crickets chirp in the distance. Breaths of Lance come out shaky, the reason either from the cold or the sheer longingness of the contact of people he misses so much. His lips twitch as he looks up at the darkness hovering beautifully, mysteriously, and magically up above—polar opposite to that of the one haunting him to shy away from sleep.  


But, it’s not as bad as before. And he knows just the answer to his why.  


Someone’s here with him.  


_Keith’s_ here with him.  


And that… doesn’t sound too shabby.  


  


* * *

  


Keith can’t sleep.  


He finally decides to accept it after tossing and turning non-stop for the past thirty minutes.  


Well, the reason is because he had seen Lance walk out of his tent earlier. Hence his inability to send himself to doze off to wake up to the morning sun as his body clock says so.  


He’s worried. And sympathizes with Lance.  


He knows how it feels like to miss your family. Even though their differences have crossed out lives, he still knows what it means to wake up someday and not hear your parents’ voices as your walking alarm clock. How it feels to be in their embrace, their presence. What it’s like not hearing their voices, through any means of communication.  


He knows. All too well, perhaps, to consider his sympathy as more of empathy other than the latter.  


So, he exits his tent, zips it close, and walks towards the creek.  


For him, the creek has always been a place to unwind. To let the breeze touch his face, like breaths of someone who had ice cubes in their mouth but on a much larger scale. To set his sights on the peaceful ambience of the quiet of the night. To watch the glow of the moon reflect off of the ripples in the body of water at his twelve. To witness the wildflowers dancing to the wisps and whispers of the rhythm of the wind. To hear the crickets chirp in their distinct voices, speaking a language Keith probably figures he’s never going to understand, but listens to anyway.  


But there’s a certain sound he finds himself tuning in to.  


A voice in a faint projection of feelings finds its way into Keith’s ears. “I miss them,” the voice says, sounding tired and breathy with a hint of held-back melancholy. As he gets closer to the voice, making sure to walk quietly and carefully as to not scare or snap them off of their lachrymose stupor. They take in breaths, inconsistent at first, but only speaking once their rhythm of inhalation and exhalation has come to a more reasonable cadence. “I miss my parents.”  


And, maybe Keith already knows who it is before he can confirm with his own two eyes.  


He finds Lance sitting vulnerably on a chopped-up log, gaze up towards the night sky. In his perspective, moonlight highlights his arms and shoulders, shading the back of his head and spine. He watches in silence as the other boy averts his stare from the alluring imitation of light of the moon, to the soil at his feet, his body swaying slightly in which Keith can only assume that he’s drawing something on the loose ground with his foot. The boy speaks to no one in a hushed tone, whispering to the winds as if longing to commune with someone. He mentions names—family members, Keith figures—and then continues on to what he misses about them. He sighs, dragging it out for a few seconds before he goes onto his grandparents, and names of things Keith can’t quite make out because they’re in a language foreign to his tongue.  


Keith can only hear two things now.  


One is the sound of Lance letting out a shaky exhale, coming off as him trying to hold himself into place as to not break apart and shatter into a million broken pieces.  


And two is the sound of his own heart shattering.  


_Oh, Lance._  


Keith hasn’t realized that he doesn’t keep the other boy’s name contained in his thought bubble, as Lance whips around at the mention of it. “Oh. Uh. Hey, Keith.”  


_Oh, quiznak._  


“Are you okay?” Keith manages, brushing aside his thoughts of slipping up and deciding to sit himself beside Lance to at least provide a presence, a sense of comfort— _anything_ — to distract him from the utter damage to his heart as a result of his homesickness.  


Lance shifts his gaze almost immediately at Keith’s question, peering beyond the water and through the shadows of the trees. Keith’s heart drops like a stone sinking to the bottom of the river ahead of them. “Yeah,” Lance whispers, with Keith knowing well that it’s a lie that easily slips off of someone who feels the exact opposite of _okay_. “I’m alright. When am I ever not?”  


Right then and there, Keith wants to scoff out loud and call out Lance on the bluff that fools no one, not even himself, but he keeps his cool, being understanding of Lance’s feelings by putting himself in his shoes for a moment, and yet responding truthfully regardless. “Right now.”  


He watches Lance fidget, not fully anticipating that he’ll outright deny Keith’s honesty by saying, “Don’t worry about it. It’s… alright.”  


But Keith doesn’t complain. Or tell him he’s wrong. He doesn’t even try to wrap his arms around Lance because, even though every fiber of his being _screams_ to _just do it_ , it will just come off as wrong. And maybe he won’t like that. And it’s especially unusual for him because he has this “don’t fucking touch me” look and feel to him that he wears on his sleeve as practically a default expression. But it just— _feels_ like Lance needs it. Needs someone to make him feel as though he’s not alone. That he doesn’t have to deal with the pain he carries all by himself. That everyone cares about him. Worries about him.  


He doesn’t do anything, though, except to focus his gaze on the moonlight reflecting off of and dancing on the water. He knows that it will come off as… _strange_ if he just hugs him out of nowhere, so instead, he asks Lance a question. Something direct to the point that might catch his attention. “You miss home, don’t you?”  


He hears a chuckle from beside him, a rather doleful sound amidst the otherwise cheerful demeanor more commonly projected by the said person. “How’d you know?”  


Keith only shrugs. He tells Lance that he’s not exactly subtle about it.  


“How so?” Lance questions, voice not any more or any less indifferent than before.  


“This isn’t the first time you couldn’t bring yourself to sleep, Lance,” Keith says, as a matter-of-factly, hyper-aware of the times he’d catch him slipping out of the comfort of his tent to watch the stars and ruminate about unspoken feelings of missing important parts of his life. This is just the only time Keith had enough energy to actually confront him.  


And Lance, in all his glory to try and lighten the mood and his own, he smirks and jokes around with, “You spying on me, Kogane?”  


As much as Keith wants to keep hearing Lance’s playful voice and the smirk lurking in the tone of it, he focuses on trying to get his point across. “I’m worried about you. All of us are.”  


Unbeknownst to Keith, Lance apologizes. Now, keep in mind that Keith isn’t exactly one for conversation, so as one can imagine, he’s in a bit of a panic now to not make Lance feel as though the burden he carries gets any heavier as his heart does. So, he tries his best to reassure him that it’s alright and there’s nothing to be sorry about.  


Keith isn’t sure how many stars there are in the night sky above them. And he isn’t exactly sure _why_ he’s thinking about stars now. Maybe he just… wants Lance to understand that there really is nothing wrong with missing your family.  


Because he does it, too. All the time.  


“Yeah. I miss them,” Lance admits. “Maybe too much.”  


It may or may not just be the moment that left Lance with no choice but to say it in all its raw and unpolished form, but… it makes Keith feel as though he can be someone Lance can confide in about these kinds of situations.  


And Keith _knows_. He does, because sometimes, the most obvious expression is painted on Lance’s face and the way his body speaks when his voice fails so. That’s why he agrees with him, letting him know that he knows what Lance has been feeling before he even had a chance to come forward and say it himself.  


He just had just waited. It’s the mantra Shiro practically beat into his head. _Patience yields focus._  


A few more questions get asked by Lance for Keith to answer before he had a chance for his turn. “Aren’t you cold?” is the question Keith used that had Lance letting untrue statements slip past his lips in hesitation.  


“…No. No, not really,” is what Lance answers. And right then and there, Keith, for some reason, decides to dedicate his life and resources to protecting this boy. But maybe that will come off as too excessive, so he insists on offering Lance his red jacket, being more stubborn than the other boy as he takes it off willingly and drapes it on Lance’s shoulders. That gesture all but makes his heart melt into the ground and freeze up at the wind all at the same time because—  


Lance _smiles_. So, Keith reciprocates, smiling wider beyond his control.  


He doesn’t know how long they sit there. Neither does the boy beside him, it seems.  


But they take it in tandem, not sounding too shabby in each other’s presence.  


“It’s cold out,” Keith says. He gets a hum of agreement in response. “Maybe we should get back now?”  


“Keith,” Lance says determinedly, like he has something important to mention after speaking his name, taking the other boy aback in his suggestion, “Look up.”  


“What?”

“Just look up. And trust me.”  


“…Okay.”  


And look up Keith does. It’s no exaggeration when he says the sight empties almost all the air out of his lungs, because the clouds have cleared out from above their heads, revealing the breathtaking beauty of stars splattered about in a black canvas with the full moon eloquently presenting itself in the center of it all.  


“It’s… so…”  


“’Ethereal’,” Lance supplies. “I’ve been thinking about it earlier.”  


“…What’s that mean?”  


“Heavenly. Celestial, if you will.”  


Keith kneads his lips together like a dough made of flesh. “How’d you describe it in your language?”  


Lance smiles a little at that. Subtle, warm, and content at that sentence, like he had been thinking about it, too. “I’m not as fluent in my native tongue as I am in English, and I know—crazy, right?” He chuckles. “…But the word I’d use is _maganda_. It means ‘beautiful’ in Tagalog. Or, well, sentence-wise, I’d say ‘ _Ang ganda_ ,’ which then translates to ‘It’s beautiful.’”  


Keith turns his head subtly to the side, just enough to get a good view of Lance. “I see,” he simply says in response. But resurfacing in his sea of thoughts are the little details in the other boy’s face he’s never taken notice of previously, until now.  


Freckles. Have they always been there before?  


Lance’s skin looks like the perfect canvas for the stars he seemed to have rearranged himself from the night sky and pulled them down to his cheeks. Moonlight gyrates stunningly in the glassy exterior of his incredibly blue irises.  


Heavenly. Celestial, if he says so.  


And _beautiful_ he is.  


No one really knows how much longer they sit there.  


But as far as sleeping goes, Keith sure is more than satisfied to have been providing company and watching the stars.  


Both up, up, and above, soaring high in the limitless sky—and down, down below on Lance’s face where he keeps falling and falling.  


Over and over.  


“Alright, man,” Lance stands up and rubs his hands together before stuffing them into the pockets of his olive-green jacket. “Do you wanna… head back now?”  


Snapped out of his smitten stupor, Keith shakes his head a little and clears his throat. He stands up as well, muttering a “Yeah” in agreement and tugging at his fingerless gloves without a real reason to supply his why. “Let’s head back.”  


  


* * *

  


The walk back to camp is a rather quiet one. Serene, if one can consider it to be. Heels of boots and sneakers alike crunch at the soil beneath. Strange, enthusiastic chirps of crickets resound in the distance and nearby. Small, easy and warm breaths against a pair cold hands and the other pair stuffed deliberately in one’s pockets sewed onto the front of their ripped jeans. Cold, brisk air touches both the boys’ exposed faces like dead hands, similar in preposition to the lower temperature of wind on the ground during a land breeze.  


“…You’re really not cold, are you?” Lance asks, voice sounding concerned and husky, likely due to exhaustion or chill winds to his throat. “I can give you your jacket back, if that’s—”  


“No, it’s okay,” Keith says, holding a hand up and waving it side to side to further signal his disapproval. “Like I said, I’m used to the cold.”  


“So, what, are you, like, numb?”  


“Eh,” Keith shrugs, “not really. I just maybe don’t feel it that much.”  


“Exactly. That’s kind of being numb, don’t you think?”  


“What? No, it’s—” jacket-less boy to Lance’s right raises an eyebrow, scrunching his eyebrows together a bit. “Well, kind of, I guess.”  


Chuckling, Lance adjusts the jacket he had no possession over by tugging at the collar and wiggling his shoulder slightly until it fits snugly. “Thought so.”  


A silhouette of a makeshift roof made from a huge scrap of black tarpaulin they found in a junkyard a few weeks back slants from the trunk of a tree, a light dangling near the pole supporting the roof with a few tight knots in a strong rope guiding both the boys’ way to their camp. With the help of Hunk and Shiro’s manpower, Pidge put their knacks and talents for building to use setting up the place. It’s like the heart of the camp, or as one can consider the multi-purpose room, or more specifically, the kitchen. It’s where they wash dishes, brew coffee, cook food, dine, and shit-talk about life in, sitting in the humble interior of the dining room replica.  


It’s also where Lance directs Keith wordlessly to rummage around in.  


“What are you doing?” dumbfounded and genuinely confused, Keith turns the lamps on above the—well, if you can call a plastic drum filled with water in a corner of the makeshift kitchen a _sink_ , then go right ahead—and the one above the dining table. “Aren’t you supposed to be sleeping?”  


“Cool your jets, Keith. I’m not tired yet, and I just… maybe want something to drink.”  


Keith, eyeing the kettle on Lance’s hand and the cocoa powder in the counter skeptically, crosses his arms over his chest. “Do you even know how to make it?”  


“ _Duh_ ,” Lance says confidently, because he has _full_ confidence in remembering _all_ of the steps Coran had previously taught him to make it. It is just water and cocoa powder, isn’t it?  


“Look, if you just use water and cocoa powder, you’re basically just trying to bloom it,” Keith informs, taking off his fingerless gloves and putting them on the table before opening the ice box at his feet and digging his hands into the mound of ice.  


“Since when do you know anything about baking?”  


“It’s not _baking_ , Lance,” Keith huffs, putting a bottle in the beam of light to see its label. “It’s something my dad taught me.”  


“…Your dad?”  


“Yeah. Back when I was younger.”  


Lance purses his lips. “…Alright.”  


Keith finishes up with his ingredient hunting, carrying a bottle of whole milk and—  


“Where in the _hell_ did you get chocolate?”  


“What?” Keith holds the hand up with the thin, rectangular box clasped in his grip. “I bought it in the supermarket we stopped by a few days ago.”  


“Wh—you _paid_ for it?”  


“Uh, yeah…? Like a normal person?”  


“You coulda just, I don’t know—taken it off the shelf and shoved it in your backpack or something?”  


“And what? Risk getting caught?”  


Lance grabs the bar off of Keith’s hand, “And you got _dark chocolate_?” clearly not listening because maybe he’s a bit overwhelmed and preoccupied with surprise.  


“I mean, it was on sale—”  


“And it’s _Lindt_ , too?” A hand runs along Lance’s scalp. “Oh, man, Keith. You’re living the _life_ , and you didn’t tell me?”  


Keith throws his arms to the side, fingers of his hands slightly folded with the backs of both facing Lance. His eyebrows are up high on his face, shortening his forehead by half and expanding his eyes by a double. “What was I supposed to do?”  


“I don’t know, come up to me and went, ‘Oh, hey, Lance. I found some chocolate. Just thought you should know so you could get some for yourself,’ like a normal, selfless, sharing-is-caring teammate?”  


“What the—You’re being over dramatic—”  


“Uh,” Lance holds a hand up to shut the other boy up, “am _not_.”  


A heated sigh finds its way out of Keith’s mouth as he set the ingredients down onto the counter, taking the chocolate bar from Lance’s grip. “Look, I’ll just show you how it’s done, okay?”  


Lance pouts, pretty much adorably, but complies anyway. “Alrighty, then, Mullet.”  


“It’s not a—” Okay, Keith. Don’t strangle him. _Don’t strangle him._ “I told you. Water and cocoa powder? No.”  


“Wha—but that’s what Coran showed me!”  


“You and Coran have no taste, then.”  


Lance’s jaw hangs astounded, a hand of his dramatically pressing against his chest and the other on his hip to balance out the jacket hanging loosely on his shoulders. “I cannot believe this disrespect.”  


“It’s not disrespect, it’s just the truth. Do you want a bitter hot chocolate?”  


“I was gonna add sugar!”  


“Yeah, but it still won’t taste like anything.”  


“Says the guy who drinks his coffee _black_.”  


“I’m _lactose intolerant_ ,” Keith says, as a matter of fact. “I still add sugar to make it taste like something more than coffee.”  


Lance scoffs and rolls his eyes. “Yeah, but like, a _crap ton_ of it.”  


Keith groans as he lolls his head back. “Look, do you want hot chocolate or no?”  


“Of course I do!”  


“Then maybe do you and I a favor and let me just show you how to make it?”  


_Jesus, there’s just no_ Back Out Option _for this guy, is there?_ Lance’s inner voice complains internally. “Alright, alright. Go ahead, hothead.”  


Keith huffs, grabbing a clean saucepan from the dish rack and setting it on the stove. He opens the bottle of milk he collected from the ice box, pouring a generous amount of the stuff onto a measuring cup Lance has no idea where he got. Probably from the trip to the supermarket as well, or just something Hunk informed him of. “Okay, first, you gotta put some milk in.”  


“How much?”  


“I don’t know, two—three cups?”  


“…You are seriously—”  


“—Bad at this, I know. You don’t have to remind me.”  


Lance chuckles a little, and Keith’s simmering blood seemingly transfers its heat onto his cheeks at the sound of it. “How much are you putting right now?”  


“Three.”  


“…You _just_ said you were lactose intolerant.”  


Keith shrugs. “I mean, it’s not like I have it every day.”  


“Fair point. But still, you’re probably gonna baptize our bathroom _sacredly_.”  


Keith scoffs, a small smile painting his lips. “I guess I better be ready for it.”  


He pours out the decided amount of milk onto the saucepan. He then grabs the pack of sugar Lance had planned on using earlier to then instruct him to, “Just a little bit of sugar is good. And then the heat goes on medium.”  


Lance hums in agreement, ultimately deciding to just listen instead of voicing out one of a million counter-arguments in the back of his mouth. Or tease him. Whatever.  


“And now,” Keith pulls on the paper wrapping the chocolate bar by the back, obtaining the foiled bittersweet indulgent treat and tearing away at the packaging, “break that up so it melts easily.”  


Lance crosses his arms over his chest, with Keith’s jacket hangs loosely over his shoulders, threatening to slip off. “You’re usually so reckless, since when were you so analytical about this stuff?” he asks, still listening but half-teasing.  


“Shut up. Do we have a—” Keith’s eyes wander around the kitchen, but figures to just, “fuck it. We don’t have a whisk. Can you get that spoon?”  


Lance hands him the wooden spoon.  


“It’ll melt on its own. We don’t wanna overheat the chocolate because it might split and form clumps and I doubt you’ll like that.”  


“Why, though? It’ll still be chocolate-y.”  


“Trust me,” Keith twists his neck to the side to face Lance to say, “It’s weird and gross,” before averting his gaze back to the concoction.  


“Okay,” Lance’s shoulders shoot up. “You do you. You’re in charge.”  


After a few minutes of stirring, and a lot of watching on Lance’s part, the chocolate has finally melted into the milk. “Alright, it’s all looking… the same now.”  


“Homogenous?” Lance provides.  


“Yes, that word,” Keith agrees. He grabs a dry metal spoon to scoop up a fair amount of the concoction he’s been brewing up, blowing on it a little and slurping it up like soup to taste. “You know where the salt is?”  


“Right here,” Lance darts over to the spot below where the coffee maker is placed. In his hand is a small, circular container with a dark blue lid on top as he hands it over to Keith.  


“Thanks,” Chef-of-Apparently-Good-Hot-Chocolate in a matter of a few minutes voices out his appreciation in Lance’s cooperation as he sprinkles a pinch of salt on the hot milk, sugar, and chocolate solution.  


“ _Soooo_ ,” Lance drawls, looking over Keith’s shoulder as he tries to get a better view of Keith’s actions, garnering a deadpan “What?” in lieu of response.  
“What’s the salt for?”

“It’s to bring out the chocolate flavor,” Keith says, stirring continuously. “Other people put coffee in it, but this was how my dad did it.”  


“Oh, I see.”

Keith turns the heat down to low to bring the mixture down to a bare simmer. He grabs the spoon again to taste the blend of varying ingredients, subtly humming enthusiastically at the taste. For him, he’s pretty much satisfied with it, and turns the heat off. A little bitter and concentrated on the chocolate flavor, and he’ll take it because it’s exactly how he likes it.  


For Lance, however…  


Well, in the pale moonlight, he’s pretty much pleased with the view he has of Keith, consisting mostly of the back of his black shirt curving into his spine and defined muscles and, well, somewhere a bit _peachy_ —  


Look. He can’t help it. Keith just… looks _different_ when he’s not so much as craving for that adrenaline rush of standing at the edge of a cliff with his feet a quarter away from falling off and taking his entire body with him. A bit of an exaggeration, but that’s how Lance puts it when Keith becomes a little too carried away in being adventurous.  


Anyway. Lance needs to focus. _Sheesh_.  


Lance huffs, crossing his arms over his chest. “Are you sure that tastes good?”  


“Yes, I’m sure, Lance.”  


Lance quirks an eyebrow. “It’s just—not what I was used to.”  


“What were you used to, then?” Keith asks, setting the spoon aside and focusing his energy into measuring out a quarter cup of sugar and adding it to the hot mixture, whisking it in.  


“Well,” Lance rubs the back of his hand with a palm, “We have this chocolate drink in the Philippines called ‘Milo’. It was like,” he gestures with his hands, making two L’s with his thumbs and index fingers and aligning them to make an imperfect square, “ _this_ size in bright green packets. And let me tell you, it’s pretty sweet, but it literally tastes like _nothing_ when you just put one. So, me and my siblings usually drink about two packets, sometimes three, and _then_ it would at least taste like something, and not just some bland old water with, like, brown food coloring in it or something.  


“But sometimes, we just spoon it _straight_ out of the packet. Like, in _powdered form_.” Lance makes it a point to emphasize on how exactly they prefer it, jaw tensing and tone sharpening.  


“So, like Nutella, but in a drink?” Keith compares, hoping it’s a good simile.  


“I mean, I guess, but Milo is definitely better.”  


Keith shrugs. “I’ll take your word for it.”  


He settles with the sweet taste on his tongue followed by a bitter aftertaste once he tests it again. This is not exactly how he liked it, or remembered it, since the batches his father made gave someone such a pure chocolate experience, and this one is a tad too sweet for his liking, but it’s still great.  


His only hope is that Lance doesn’t drink it off as “too bitter”, because he knows how sweet Lance’s tooth is. He, however, prefers to actually taste the chocolate.  


And, well, he might _really_ be taking that trip to the bathroom soon after this. But, hey, YOLO, isn’t he right?  


“Do we have corn starch?” Keith asks, looking around.  


“I don’t think we—no, actually,” Lance moves the coffee maker a little to the right and perks up at the sight of a small paper box. “You’re in luck, McMullet. We still have some.”  


“Thanks,” the other boy voices out his appreciation, grabbing a tiny container from the dish rack and a brand-new spoon. He makes a slurry out of equal parts cornstarch and water, pouring it into the warm chocolate drink on the saucepan whilst stirring it in.  


“How about that? What’s that for?”  


“It’s to stabilize it. If it sits around for a while, it’ll start to fall out of suspension.”  


“Meaning?”  


He brings out two ceramic mugs and pours a generous amount of the hot chocolate in each one, setting the sauce pan back onto the now turned-off stove. “ _Meaning_ , the chocolate and the milk will separate.” He wrinkles his nose. “My dad said it’ll also give it a fluffy texture, close to what most people expect. I like it better without it, but we probably won’t be able to drink all of this, so.”  


“We’ll see about that if it’s as good as you say it is.”  


Keith only raises an eyebrow, confidence otherwise evident in the way a corner of his lips tug upwards. He hands one of the mugs to Lance. “Careful. It’s a bit hot.”  


Lance hums in understanding, a hint of impatience in the way he grabs the cup out of Keith’s hand. “Thanks. Let’s see what you kind of tricks you’re hiding under that mullet of yours.”  


“Enough with my hair already.”  


Lance smirks, wide enough that the corners of his lips peek through the rim of the mug.  


“Ow!” Lance’s hand shoots up to his mouth, helplessly attempting to remedy the burning sensation on his tongue that spread relatively quickly in his throat. This earned a chuckle from Keith, who is watching a good two feet away from him as Lance sends him a glare, thinking perhaps a bit too loudly how much of an asshole this _mullethead_ is.  


“Told you it’s hot,” Keith says in a playful tone, handing him a metal spoon. “Here. It’ll help.”  


“Gee, thanks, _sadist_ ,” Lance scoffs and rolls his eyes, but takes the spoon anyway to make his gratitude mean something else other than sarcasm. He dips the spoon onto his drink, watching the liquid swirl around with bubbles clutching onto the handle of the utensil. Steam rises to the top and makes its escape through the air. Vapor wafts in the air but barely reaches his face as he blows on his drink to cool it down.  


He wraps his hands around the mug, letting the warmth seep through his fingers and silently hopes the chill from his hands will help to get the drink down to drinking temperature. If he’s being honest, the drink smells pretty good. It seems a lot more _bougie_ than what he’s accustomed to, especially with the bar of chocolate and all that, but judging from the aroma, he’s expecting it to match up to the confidence Keith had while making it.  


Which brings one of his thoughts to surface; Keith seems to glow underneath the moonlight as pale as his skin, and he can’t exactly say he’s complaining. His hair shimmers atop his head, either due to the oil it produced or just that his hair is just really shiny. His eyes sparkle a mysterious violet, rimmed with thoughtfulness and light and a softness Lance isn’t sure he’s familiar seeing.  


Perhaps a million different sentences describing how _stunning_ he looks swim across Lance’s head in two separate languages, sometimes a mixture of both—he can’t tell. He can probably make out, like, “ _Hulog ng langit_ ”, “ _Is he_ real?”, “ _Ang ganda ng mata niya, putangina_ ”—with a few swears here and there. But they all stem from his brain going a hundred kilometers per thoughts of Keith, and he’s struggling to keep up.  


Shying his gaze away, he finally snaps out of it and feels that the warmth transferring to his hands has gone a bit colder. So, he lifts it up to his lips to taste the drink to _possibly_ prove Keith wrong and wipe that smug smile on his face that says _too much_ and knows _too much_ and is oozing with confidence that makes Lance wonder if the heat from his drink had gone into his blood instead.  


Warm liquid trickles down his throat. The temperature has gone down significantly to something he can bear. It begins with sweet notes both from the milk and the added sugar, with the aftertaste concentrated on the distinct bitterness of chocolate.  


And if he’s being honest?  


It’s good.  


Really good.  


“It’s written on your face, Lance,” Keith says, that darned grin sitting seamlessly on his face that just eats so much _shit_.  


…Keith knows, doesn’t he?  


Lance is not amused. Not even the slightest.  


He sighs, still not accepting the fact that he sounds so defeated. “Alright, mullet,” He says, sipping from his cup. “I’m not gonna lie. It _is_ good.”  


Look, all Lance wants is to make Keith eat it up that there is nothing better than eating an instant chocolate milk powder straight from the pack, but he can’t protest any longer because the distinct taste of chocolate dissolved in milk with such a fluffy texture can’t exactly match up to a drink that still tastes like water when you put a single pack.  


And, maybe… the way Keith’s face lights up when he just _knows_ Lance is wrong and what he did is leagues better encourages heat to pool in his stomach and spread across his heart to then distribute it to his cheeks. No amount of denial can contradict what is painted on his face and how it makes his heart pound deafeningly in his ears.  


Because this boy is _fine_.  


_Beautiful_ , if he says so.  


“…Is there something on my face?” Keith asks reluctantly, skeptical about where Lance’s gaze meets its end.  


A sputtering of incoherent words that mostly only come out as half-choked sounds are the results of Keith’s curious question striking Lance out of his pining daze. “What—? Oh, uh,” _cough_ , “there’s a—” Alright, Lance. Don’t screw it up. Even though it’s _really_ adorable, “you got, something, uh,” It’s honestly really smooth of him to fumble a gesture with his fingers, “on top of your lips.”  


As slick as Lance is, he grandiosely _fucked_ that up—but he can only hope his point goes across.  


Keith wipes the area below his nose with the back of his hand, muttering an “oh” at the sight of hot chocolate that thickened as it cooled fresh on his skin. “No wonder you were looking at me weird.”  


A word in Lance’s headspace is drawled by his inner monologue.  


_Adorable.  
_

Lance wishes he can smack himself upside the head, because one should not be thinking that their _friend_ is— _adorable_ ¬, right? The only way they’d find their friends adorable is if they like them.  


And does Lance… like Keith?  


Who knows, really?  


Not wanting to dig deeper into a hole he wants his feelings to be kept buried in, he occupies his mind with thoughts of his family.  


Which, with accordance to his homesickness, is not a pleasant retreat.  


But then again…  


This is the closest to home he’s ever gotten. He thinks about it, mind pacing like he is calculating a thousand mathematical equations a second. Someone to be open to, someone to sit down with to enjoy a warm beverage together—someone who is _there_.  


For once, Lance feels like this is exactly where he needs to be.  


A long, deep intake of breath, and he smiles.  


“Thanks, man.”  


Keith studies him for a moment, gaze confused, eyes searching, and then… heart understanding.  


“You’re welcome, Lance.”  


Lance smiles. And sure enough, he feels it reaching his eyes.  


No matter how small the sense of satisfaction is, it’s there. Warm, comforting and inviting in the form of a cup of bitter and sweetness, with someone who actually _listens_ to him and _knows_ how it all feels like. He finds it in the secure silence between him and Keith, not forcing any conversations and finding solace in one topic to the next. He encounters it in the delightful tugging of his heartstrings whenever Keith laughs softly at one of his jokes or one of the silly stories he has with his family.  


“Wait, wait, wait,” Keith says, struggling to make out words in between giggles. “Your dad mistook Veronica for your _mom_?”  


“Yeah!” Lance says, volume a bit louder than previously with the preceding parts of his story. “Look, okay, so Veronica was like, sitting in front of her laptop, right? And when my dad came downstairs, she had her back turned on him, so all he could see was the back of her head. And so, my dad went, in Tagalog, ‘Oh, I thought you were already at work?’  


“And then my sis turns around and goes, ‘Dad. Mom already left for work.’ And then my dad was so embarrassed.” Lance concludes as he sips from his cup again, happily seeing Keith burst into a fit of held-back laughter with his story, warmth seeping into his throat and mostly pooling in his heart.  


Then, like a gunshot, another recollection of his parents’ mishaps fires a string of words from the tip of his tongue. “Oh, get this,” he starts, Keith following along to listen. “We all used to sleep in the same room. So, I slept between Marco, my older brother, and my little sister, Niña. My brother had school the next day, so he got up way earlier than any of us did, _duh_ ,” Keith hums along to the nodding of his head.  


“Anyway,” Lance continues, “My mom went to our room a few hours later, and she was shouting.” He witnesses in amusement as Keith’s eyebrows shoot up in contrast to his mouth gaping a bit open. “Yeah, she was yelling something along the lines of, again, in my native tongue, ‘Marco! It’s already time, and you’re going to be late for school again!’” He mimics her anger dramatically and inaccurately with a high-pitched squeak.  


“And then I went,” Lance tilts his head slightly, eyes half-lidded, expression dropping and mouth hanging open as he croaks exhaustingly, “‘Ma… it’s still morning and you’re already screaming. _Kuya_ already went to school hours ago.”  


He isn’t even finished with the story when Keith bursts into another string of giggles, Lance baring no mind to it as it is music to his ears. Keith rarely ever laughs as loud as that, so he drinks it up like fine wine.  


“We’re not even to the best part yet!”  


“Do—tell—” Keith’s laughs are hidden behind gloved hand.  


“She went, ‘ _Ay_ , sorry’. And then she _legit_ probably could not contain her embarrassment either, because even though I was so tired, I could _feel_ it through the way her voice softened and she laughed a little. It made everyone crack up when she retold it to everyone.”  


Keith’s bubble of giggles and laughs continue for a few more taken minutes, before slowly retreat back into his system, though the mirth remains evidently obvious in the way his eyes crinkle and the huge grin plastered on his face. “Your family is _weird_.”  


“I know. But I still love them,” Lance says, surprised at how soft it sounds that it makes his heart melt a little.  


Keith can say the same for his, too.  


Yet strangely enough for Lance, his yearning for the pearl doesn’t bother him as much as it did earlier.  


Because right here, right now—  


It feels like home.  


To the clueless naked eye, they can spot two boys sitting on the table and chuckling to themselves, sipping nonchalantly on their hot chocolate.  


But for the said two boys, it’s a moment shared with utmost vulnerability and enjoyment they feel as though all of the weight upon their shoulders has melted off and are now seeping into the soil beneath them.  


They don’t know how long they sit there. But they know they won’t have any hot chocolate left for anyone else in the morning everyone’s up because most of it found its way into Lance’s stomach.  


Not that he’s complaining. It had been scrumptious, to say the least, and he enjoyed it to the bearings of his delight. And as lactose intolerant Keith is, he can only drink so much of it as to not send himself doubled up in pain in their makeshift bathroom.  


Plus, they got to spend time together. To have this bonding moment, all to themselves as they are—as Keith and Lance.  


And neither of them think that it’s too bad.  


  


* * *

  


“Let me handle that,” Lance says, seizing the dirty mugs carefully from Keith’s grasp and setting it on their sink. “You go clean up and put the ingredients back where they belong.”  


Keith raises an eyebrow at him, ready to evoke a defensive reaction from Lance with a hundred rebuttals in the back of his throat. But instead, he swallows them down because he’s practically too tired to deal with the next string of a hundred more strike backs from Lance, and just obliges.  


For once, Keith is alright with the silence in between them as they proceed with tasks that had been assigned to them by Lance. The quiet is comfortable. Not awkward. Perhaps a reasonable recharge from the stories and laughter they shared mere minutes ago.  


Still, he wants it to linger for some more time. Just a bit.  


Lance thinks so, too.  


Alas, like the cap on a soda bottle, their words stay sealed like carbonation, waiting for that messy release from agitation.  


It’s saved for when they’re finished, though.  


“Hey…” Lance begins, turning off the faucet and flicking his wrists after cleaning out the sink.  


“Hm?”  


“Could I sleep with you?”  


The bottle cap has been opened. Keith’s eyes shoot wide open. Lance’s reciprocate.  


“ _I mean_ , like, not _sleep with you_ , but like, sleep _beside_ you—” Lance tries his poor best attempt at damage control, but the blurted words have already reached Keith’s ears.  


He takes it better than Lance, though. “Uh,” _ehem_ , “that’s okay.”  


Exhaling a breath he doesn’t know he’s been holding in, Lance rubs the wet tips of his damp fingers on his palms. “Really…?”  


“Is it trouble with your sleeping?”  


“Well, yeah.”  


“Figured as much.”  


Keith takes it back. The air around them has become awkward. Mildly awkward, but awkward nonetheless. They both feel it as they exit the multi-purpose room and trudge through the dimly lit surroundings of their camp, towards everyone’s tents. One of them hopes to break it with a collection of words.  


“I’m surprised you just… agreed,” Lance says, incredulous.  


Keith shrugs, looking ahead. “If it helps you sleep at night.”  


At that, Lance lets himself smile. Just a little. “Thanks, man.”  


Keith returns it.  


As they near their tents, they stop mid-way to contemplate about which tent to—  


“My tent is fit for two people, so I think it’s better if we, uh, sleep there instead,” Lance suggests, the word _sleep_ a little dry on his tongue and feels like it had been clogging up his throat.  


Keith analyzes him for a moment, before agreeing, shoulders raising and head slightly tilting. He follows Lance into his tent.  


He doesn’t as much as gape at Lance’s clutter strewn on the groundsheet of the tent as the solar-powered lamp floods light into the space.  


“Oof, sorry, it’s messy.”  


Keith shakes his head, brushing it aside, because he’s well aware it’s a vague representation of the thoughts that keep Lance up in most nights. Crinkled lines on photo paper with prints of his family members are taped all across the erect fabrics of the tent, some of them lying along with the litter on the ground. One of the eyes of a pair of embroidered eyes stares at nothing in particular that belonged to a greatly small white shark, sitting comfortably in the corner next to Lance’s pillow. Pieces of scratch paper are heaped ordinately in one corner, folded into themselves Keith can only guess to have something important written into the leaves.  


He understands. Lance misses his family so much.  


Words aren’t necessary to know it’s fact, with the way Lance smiles fondly at the pictures, ironic to his forlornly faraway gaze, desiring that phantom reality he once lived.  


Keith gets it. Lance doesn’t try to hide it.  


Exhaustion can truly bring out the vulnerability in a person.  


“Make yourself comfortable, mullet,” Lance says, voice huskier from his body’s willingness to sleep. He yawns, softly smacking his lips together, wearily eyeing Keith doing as he told him to. The other boy sits beside him, not looking too energetic either.  


Lance lays on his side, head propped up on his forearm, eyes forward facing Keith’s legs but barely cracking open. Keith follows, hesitant at first, but proceeds anyway with meeting his gaze with Lance’s.  


He lets another moment pass by, mesmerized by the dusting of freckles that resemble stars on Lance’s cheeks.  


Boy with said freckles that mirror stars, through drowsily opened eyes, look directly into the purple irises of the breathing body beside him.  


“My mom said to rest for 30 minutes first before lying down…” Lance mumbles, eyelids heavy as he fights to stay awake.  


“But you’re already lying down,” Keith points out.  


“Yeah,” Lance laughs softly, turning to lie on his back. “She’ll forgive me. I’m so tired.”  


Keith lets out a short, conceding sound.  


“M’sorry.”  


“Stop it with the sorries. Nothin’ to be sorry for.”  


“It’s just… askin’ you sleep w’ me…”  


“It’s fine, Lance. I don’t mind.”  


“So y’won’t mind ol’ Shark Tank here…” Lance clumsily tries to reach the stuffed shark behind his head. “Been w’ me for a while. Helps me sleep.”  


“Mmh. Seems cool.”  


“She is. S’cool.”  


“And ‘Shark Tank’?”  


Lance rasps out a chuckle. “Lil’ sister. Told me it reminded her of that show, Shark Tank. So we rolled with it.”  


“That’s… cute.”  


“Cute isn’t something I’d expect to hear from you, Mullet.”  


Keith laughs a little at that. “Dunno. I’m being honest here.”  


“M’kay. Gotcha.”  


Faint chirps of crickets fill their comprehension of the world around them, along with the brisk, cold air that mellows out the warmth of their body heat circulating in the tent, forming an equilibrium of some kind.  


“Could you tell me about… something else you miss from the Philippines?” asks Keith.  


“Hm?” Lance hums as he cracks an eye open, before promptly letting it flutter close again. “Oh. Mmh, sure. Definitely the food. Dishes. _Sinigang_ —” _a yawn_ , “— _sinigang_ was my favorite. People know us of _adobo_ but I never understood why t’was so popular. S’ good, though.”  


“Why was, uh, _sini… si-siniga_ —”  


“ _Sinigang_ ,” Lance corrects, amused at Keith’s attempt at pronouncing the dish’s name, including the pout on his face. S’ cute.  


“That,” Keith says, sounding a little breathless. “Why was that your favorite?”  


Lance blinks at the wires supporting his tent. “There were many ways to cook it, like pork, beef, shrimp, and _bangus_.”  


“What’s… _bangus_?”  


“Hm? Oh, I think it’s… milkfish.”  


“Mmkay. Go on.”  


“The shrimp one was my favorite. Fought m’siblings for the biggest shrimp we could find. T’was my mom’s favorite, too. So when it’s what we ate, it was the best of anything she cooks. It’s like, comfort food for us all.”  


“How’d it taste like?”  


“Sour,” Lance replies almost instantaneously. “And a little spicy. It’s ‘specially good when you combine it with fish sauce.”  


“I see.”  


The fabric underneath them shifts as Lance bends his knees closer to his body, but they mostly end up touching Keith’s own.  


“What’s got you so interested all of a sudden?” Lance asks, voice low near to a whisper.  


Keith shrugs a shoulder, particularly the one not entrapped by the pillow supporting his head. “Doesn’t hurt to know more about where you came from.”  


“Heh,” Lance acquiescently agrees, voice gruff and breathy. “Yeah. I guess you’re right.”  


Silence is deafening to their ears, and yet it’s nothing compared to the ongoing battle taking place inside their heads. Incomprehensible, for the most part, but they share one thought in common.  


_This is way_ too _intimate._  


“Since you were all about the honestly earlier…” Lance starts. It requires all of the courage, and huge kudos to the fervent desire to fall into a deep slumber for him to ask this particular question. “Uh, could we...”

“Hm?”

“Could we cuddle?”

There. Yeah. It’s out in the open. He had said what had to be said _straight_ to the point. What a way to make it _more_ intimate instead of completely ditching that road. Lance is riding shotgun at this point. Much of it is for Keith to absorb, because he is having a hard time processing it as well that his brain is practically short-circuiting. Keith’s eyes are like saucers right now. But they’re still really purple and pretty.  


_Really_ pretty. And, well— _really_ red, flush across Keith’s cheeks.  


“Uh, okay.”  


Lance swallows thickly. “Are you, uh… sure?”  


“Yeah,” Keith says, pressing his lips into a straight line. “I’m sure.”  


Their voices are barely more than whispers. The knee touch they had going on? That is practically nothing compared to whatever they’re about to do next.  


Lance is skeptical about his request. All the more skeptical when Keith had accepted it.  


But neither of them can be safer than this.  


Lance wiggles closer, until Keith’s chest encloses his cloud of vision. The smell of the other boy’s deodorant is fragrant in his nose, pleasantly attractive. Heat accumulates in his cheeks, having none other than his stuttering heart to blame for it as Keith drapes his forearm around his shoulder blades, pulling him impossibly closer.  


“Hey.”  


Lance’s voice rumbles in Keith's shirt. Keith retreats his arm around Lance to cup the other boy’s chin, lining their gazes up. He bends his arm that’s crushed under his upper body weight in front of him.  


“Here,” Keith offers. “You can rest your head on my arm.”  


Warm exhales of air blow on his face. He notices that the background where the freckles are splattered on Lance’s face has a mildly pink hue saturating it.  


Lance sits up slightly, meticulous in the action as to not bump uncomfortably into any part of Keith because distance does not exist between them at the moment. Pulling himself up and adjusting his position, he rests his head on Keith’s arm.  


“Can I put my hand on your waist?” asks Lance, voice a little hesitant and coarse.  


“Whatever makes you comfortable,” is what Keith replies.  


“…Okay.”  


Lance puts a hand on the small of Keith’s back— _totally his waist_ —trapping the other between his thighs. He tilts his head up, blearily looking at Keith and wondering unconsciously about the reason why his eyes appear to be a mystical violet.  


Keith stares back into Lance’s eyes, feeling as though he’s swimming in the blue oceans of his irises. Then, he notices a detail that slipped through their periphery.  


“You’re wearing my jacket now.”  


Lance tears his gaze away from him and smiles. He remembers slipping the long sleeves on over his jacket after they exited the kitchen, surprised at how much bigger his olive-green jacket is, but wears it on top anyway because, “It got colder. And just having it on my shoulders would make it slip off, so… yeah.”  


Keith hums.  


“Do you want it back?”  


“No. It looks like you need it more than I do.”  


“Yeah… maybe you’re right.”  


“Besides, you look really cute like that.”  


Lance stares wide-eyed at Keith, processing his compliment at around 14%. “Uh—you—you can’t just—”  


Keith raises a shoulder and lowers it all the same. He says nothing, just a smirk tugging playfully at his lips.  


Like an ostrich, Lance wants to bury his head into the ground right now. But since he’s not a bird and there’s a barrier between them and the soil beneath, he retreats and nuzzles his face in the crook of Keith’s neck. At the contact, Keith stiffens, all while Lance softens into it, cheeks raising approximately five degrees higher in temperature. Keith’s hand hovers over Lance’s shoulder, unsure of what to do with them because he needs to realize that the other boy’s face is _right on his neck_ and that his warm breath is sending shivers down Keith’s spine. He sets his palm on the other boy’s shoulder after a beat, still reluctant but melting into the touch.  


“Is this okay?” Lance’s voice comes out muffled, and Keith could be winning awards right now on being The Best Actor to Not Feeling like Dopamine is Sparking in his System and Acting Completely Natural as the vibrations of Lance’s instrument rumbles in his neck and chest.  


“Yeah,” Keith thanks the Gods to let him say he agrees without his voice cracking.  


Lance pulls him closer, clinging onto him like either a very soft pillow or a lifeline. Surely at this angle, he can hear the pounding of Keith’s heart in his ribcage, and for sure, he kind of does.  


But he pays it no mind, because his heart is doing the same.  


They stay like that for a while. A while is enough for Keith to turn slack and relax at the moment, tucking Lance’s head under his chin. A while is enough for Lance’s eyes to feel like they have weights dragging them down, with him in Keith’s tender embrace that feels like home.  


At this moment, they’ve never felt so secure and content.  


Who had known that in the four letters that make up the word _home_ , weaving them together could spark up something so laden with meaning and feelings?  


Lance strikes himself to have trouble sleeping. Same goes for Keith.  


But before they know it, they’re sound asleep, cradled in each other’s arms.  


**Author's Note:**

> Alrighty, folks. It probably took me... 2 months to write this DSAJFASJF but what matters is that it's done, so here it is! (Finally.)
> 
> I took inspiration for the setting here in Episode 3 of Life is Strange 2. It's not an _exact_ replica of the settings, per se, but similar to it, because one of the many things I like about the Life is Strange games are the sceneries. 
> 
> (Lance's pining daze of " _Ang ganda ng mata niya, putangina_ " translates roughly to, "His eyes are beautiful" along with a common Tagalog swear. And " _Hulog ng langit_ “ is "God-send" or "heaven-sent". Just in case you're wondering!) 
> 
> Oh, by the way, the hot chocolate recipe is basically from [Adam Ragusea's "Hot Chocolate with Homemade Honey Marshmallows" video](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EcBK27chvR4). Go check him out if you're interested!
> 
> HAPPY JULANCE 2020! I'm excited about what people have in store for the remaining days. And Lance's birthday is so near, I— **blows airhorns and messes with Blue's controls while screaming "LANCE IT'S YOUR BIRTHDAY" or something of the sort**
> 
> (I realized that this can also be related to the Day 29 prompt: Home.)


End file.
